Oliver placed his feet with care as he snuck through the jungle of clinging silver threads which almost seemed to be reaching out to grasp him in their grips of certain death. He could not describe how dearly he wished he could have simply dismissed even the notion of the missing people being inside this lair, if only on the basis of no one in their right mind ever coming near this labyrinth of terror. There was only a single reason he could not do so.

In a rather distressing turn of events, said reason happened to be the overwhelming evidence which pointed to this layer being the exact location of their disappearance.

He knew that from the moment he saw the accursed place, a rather obvious indicator being the trench they left behind in the fallen leaves, undisturbed due to the lack of wind in the bellow. But even so, it took him some time to enter. Mainly because arachnids, as a group, should fall in a hole and die; with only the knowledge that he was the only help they would receive pushing him to continue.

The fact that they were here before him, and rather recently as well, was quite honestly the only reason he could enter at all, at least with any form of ease. Because in a less-than-perfect decision on the part of his predecessors, they had seen the intricate net of spider silk which covered the entrance of the lair and charged through with the bravery of the desperate. The webbing later thinned out in an excellent display of resource management on the spider’s part, which Oliver despised, because it meant that the clearly large spiders were somewhat intelligent.

And as ferociously as Oliver fought against the conclusion, it was becoming increasingly obvious that the spiders of the fallen spire were truly larger than any spider of the old world. The conclusion was mostly supported by the lack of huge webs everywhere, as a traditional spider would have. No, instead there were carpets of silky thread at all entrances, to make intrusions clear from the very first moment, and then a loose net of hanging strings at all angles to track progress. The strings weren't perfect, of course, as he could still make his journey in the steps of the missing people, and while he had to rely on the path they broke open for him in the beginning, he could still progress after said path disappeared. This was also concerning, since, after a clearing of scattered silken strings, the trail vanished, with only occasional broken thread from a wayward swinging foot to lead him.

But all of that was fine, because even if he periodically lost his way, a rather terrifying prospect; it was acceptable, so long as he followed the trail while remembering the ABCs of gigantic spider survival.

Or rather, it was all fine, until he came upon a wall of webbing he could not breach as he had the earlier shifts in latitude, which was mainly done through a poly system made of socks, with the occasional mushroom acrobatics.

But now he stood before a gleaming wall of silver strings, the soft blue light of the forest reflecting eerily of them, as though they were the strings holding the spirits of the damned forever attached to where they came from, even as they wreaked havoc on the land of mortals. Or worse, they were spider threads, which while not as ethereal as the threads reminding the dead of their eternal lot, was significantly more horrifying, as they reminded those who saw them of what was near.

The only thing he could directly point to as worse about the situation than the wall itself, was the quiet mutters reaching him from beyond the wall, a clear indication of where he was needed. On the positive side, it meant he had finally reached his query after far too long in this labyrinth of fright, and, granted, any amount of time was far too long. But that simply meant that he had spent far, far too long inside of it.

Which meant that they had spent far far far too long here, and he could simply not allow himself to leave any creature to such a fate, even if he wished to leave with a burning passion.

So, he examined his surroundings for any way to enter without alerting the spiders, only to see the same distressingly thorough defence of their, pantry, he supposed. The main obstacle in his path, the wall, seemed to be situated between two branches, even if that was barely discernable through the thick webbing which covered them. The ceiling was made of interlocking mushroom caps, with webs covering any holes between them, and the walls were essentially thinner versions of the large one, with webs stretched between the stalks of mushrooms. All except for the ceiling directly above the wall, which was of course covered completely with a thick net of spider silk.

All entrance points were, in other words, compromised.

But, even so, that was simply one aspect of the problem, the other aspect was his own capabilities, and what the spiders knew. He had to assume that with the intelligence which the spiders exhibited until that point, the floor of their pantry would be made of webbing, to ensure that if their food left they would know immediately. This was both positive and negative, Oliver surmised, because while it prevented them from escaping covertly, it also opened up many possibilities when he could disregard stealth, to a certain point. He was fairly certain that he could not break the wall even with his metal ball, and while he could support his own weight, he knew he did not have the control necessary to lift himself with his chain.

Oliver almost began to pace as he considered their conundrum before he remembered the detection strings all around them. He knew he needed to do something to save them, but he could not think of even the sliver of the beginning of a remedy for their situation. He could attempt to gain enough skill with mana manipulation to actually carry himself with it, but even after weeks of training, he was only unskilled at it, which happened to be the third skill level. He supposed he could attempt a distraction of some sort, but either he would be too slow to flee his own distraction due to the webs, or he would leave a very noticeable trail.

Oliver sighed as he ran his hands over his face, smiling brightly as they fell away. He didn’t know what to do, but there had to be some solution, and so long as he kept attempting to locate said solution, he would. He took a deep breath as he craned his neck backwards, considering what Aelin or Emma might do in this situation, but realising moments later that there was a slight possibility that they wouldn’t be here in the first place. Maybe he should simply attempt to breach the wall with force alone, even if it might possibly not actually accomplish anything. He needed to take a venture on some possibility at some point either way.

He paused as he looked upwards, a fantastic idea sparking to life in his mind. He may not be able to break through the wall with his extend-o-ball, but that was simply not the case for the mushroom caps. They were durable enough to walk upon, yes, but it was quite easy to break them with even the slightest actual effort, and so long as he made the caps fall down properly, they would make quite the phenomenal ramp.

Oliver continued to grin as he stretched his arm towards the ceiling, the long stream of socks uncoiling from his arm as they formed a facsimile of a spring floating around it, the only parts not part of the spring being the ball which floated in line with his arm, albeit some distance away, and the part at the opposite end tied to his shoulder.

The ball of iron shot forth as though it was shot from a bow, the socks floating coiled around his arm uncoiling until it reached the ceiling, smashing a hole through the mushroom as tiny flecks of mushroom fell around him. And some of said clumps floated, supported only by barely visible strings. Huh. Well, he would simply have to hurry, and hope that the vibration was minute enough to not be noticed. It probably wouldn’t be.

He continued to punch a series of holes through the ceiling, ensuring that they started above him, before widening to a sturdy base, and then towards the wall, so that when it collapsed under its own weight, it would fall into a ramp. It was over far more swiftly than he would have initially imagined, and soon enough the ceiling fell, and a ramp for him to climb was made.

“Have no fear!” Oliver called as he stood atop the wall, looking over the five people gathered in the pantry, which was apparently more of a plateau than anything. “why?” Oliver glanced around at them, smiling brightly. They were quite different, each in their own ways. One was simply a human guy, dark hair and eyes with caramel skin, maybe a head-and-a-half shorter than Oliver himself, but quite nice, if his smile was anything to go by. The others were more interesting, with two eleves with dusty brown skin, reminding Oliver of desert sand at night, one male and one female, as far as he could tell, and both the same height. Oh, and the man had a scorpion tail, and the woman had the horns of a ram. The last two seemed to be a feathered man with talons, and a short, bald, incredibly pale woman half his height who seemed drowsy as she looked upon him. “Because we are escaping this maze of dread, and so long as you follow the ABCs of gigantic spider avoidance, you never have anything to fear!” he smiled.

The female elf looked at him with pale purple eyes “fantastic, I will either be executed for being a disobedient prisoner,” she glanced over his torso and arms, both thin with almost no muscle, before looking at his still splinted leg. “Or I will die from the shame of being saved by a weirdo who only wears underwear with a broken leg, and the muscle definition of a five-year-old"

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“Is being viciously sarcastic towards strangers an integral part of elven culture?” Oliver asked as he chuckled at her comment.

The other elf glanced at the one with the horns with frustration, before turning to him “No, it is not, but even if it were, there are more pressing concerns which need to be dealt with at the moment.” he said, his voice solemn “Now if you could please explain these ‘ABC’s’ as you call them, so we can make our escape.”

“Of course, now,” Oliver glanced around, only to see that they seemingly found themselves within a crown of branches with a platform between them, and steep drops after all five exits. He started creating a new ramp at the one next to where he entered. “The ABCs are as follow, Awareness, Backtracking, and Cowardice. Awareness to watch out for the spider threads, and spiders, backtracking because it is better to not touch any threads and take longer than for them to know where you are, and cowardice, because spiders are terrifying and I would rather run away” As he spoke, Oliver made crude hand gestures for b and c “and when anyone makes these signals, we either all turn around to find a new path, or run away in a controlled fashion without breaking any strings, understood?” He smiled as another ramp fell down.

“Buddy” the bird man walked up to Oliver and patted his shoulder from behind, even as Oliver carved six pieces of foamy mushroom from the ceiling “that does not even slightly spell ABC”

“Yes, it does, Robin,” Said the other human.

Oliver started to hand out mushroom pieces before he walked to the exit opposite where he entered.

“Hey, I'm not gonna say no to the man with a plan and a magic extendable punch, even if he can’t spell” The bird man joked.

Oliver clapped to get their attention “alright ladies and gentlemen, I want it to be clear that the other ramp is purely to make the giant spiders think we went that way, now, hopefully-” Oliver stopped mid-sentence to look at the bird man “Wait, did you say that I cannot spell? OH! Vernacular of vastly varied worlds! It must prioritize message over acronyms! A ludicrous mistake, of course, but incredibly interesting. I wonder how that will affect music in the future?” Oliver started to question.

“Is now really the time, mister living linguine?” the horned elf asked, impatiently holding her piece of mushroom cap.

Oliver looked at her with a smile, before shrugging his shoulders “Honestly? I feel like we could be eaten by gigantic spiders at absolutely any point in our lives, but discovering the secrets of the new universe? Probably not. So really, which is more important?” Oliver asked, looking around expectantly, and yet was mostly met with raised eyebrows, but with grins from the other human and the bird person.

“Fine, fine, I will continue saving our lives and whatnot,” Oliver said.

Oliver then explained his plan to mislead the spiders into a fruitless hunt by pretending to have used the other ramp while they actually jumped down elsewhere. They then asked why they had to jump and not use the chain of socks which could withstand being treated like a morningstar, and he explained that it really only was held together with magic, and that they would be giving up their only weapon if it broke. The pale woman then retorted that her fists were weapons, and then proceeded to punch a dent into the bark of one of the pillar branches, because apparently, dwarves had fists of steel in this world. Maybe Aelin was onto something. It also turned out that dwarves were cold-blooded, and that she was permanently drowsy because of said fact.

They slowly made their way through the winding tunnels of clinging silver threads and glowing mushrooms, often being forced to retreat from approaching spider-people, or turn away from corridors they could not pass. Oliver had also learned that their foes were not simply gigantic spiders, but in actuality spider people, or arachnoids. From the brief glimpses he caught of them before their group turned to flee, he assimilated quite the breadth of information of their species. It was firstly clear that they had four limbs, and even if their front limbs were quite humanoid from what he could glean, their rear limbs were more akin to those of birds, with long shins and feet, and short femurs, giving the impression of backwards knees. This, combined with their small size, allowed them to crawl along the ceiling where there were no threads, the gleam of their black eyes in the blue light of the mushrooms the only aspect which revealed their presence, as they were otherwise a pale, almost sickly white.

And while they had not been caught yet, they were too slow. If they wished to escape, they needed to change something, anything which would let them progress faster without being caught. They saw arachnoids ever more frequently, as they crawled through the lair, searching for them. They had finally realized that their second bridge was a false trail, apparently, as even more started to swarm the area, simultaneously making it quite clear that the only reason for their continued escape was the arachnoid’s exceptionally poor eyesight.

But eventually, their luck ran out, and they came to what was clearly the actual pantry. Tens of thick, heavy, bulbous sacks in the general shape of creatures from the ever-fall forest littered the bottom of the pit, the walls around it made from layers upon layers of clinging webs. There were at least a dozen entrances to the pit, most higher than the one they found themselves at, and when they looked up, they were met with further sacks, if less sizeable ones. And watching over their harvest were at least twenty arachnoids, as they crawled upon the floor to watch the largest sacks, and across the ceiling, from where they repelled down to the smaller sacks by the backs of their ankles and elbows.

The others came to stand beside Oliver as he stood at the edge of the pit. “We’ve been cornered. They're right behind us, and we can’t go forwards any longer” said the elf with the scorpion's tail, defeat in his voice.

“Well, Oliver, where is the D in ABC? Because I thought it was foolproof, right? Or maybe it isn’t, because we can’t go back, we can’t run away, and you don’t seem to have a fourth idea in your head” The horned elf sneered.

Oliver frantically looked around, searching for even the barest trace of a solution, yet found nothing.

“Kelris, I know this is not what you wanted, not what any of us wanted, but we cannot blame him for not succeeding at saving us when he had no reason to try in the first place,” The tailed elf said sternly to the visibly younger Kelris.

“Oh, I'm sorry, but I was led to believe there was an actual plan here, you know, that he might have done some actual scouting while no one knew he was there? Or maybe, I don’t know, he could have at least explained to us just how unprepared he was, so we could at least fix his idiocy” Kelris hissed, clearly angry, yet still aware enough to be quiet.

The argument of whispered fury only grew further from that point, eventually drawing in the bird guy, Qrulir, as he attempted to mediate, while Nomi, the dwarf, simply stood in a daze.

Oliver barely registered the confrontation in the background as his mind spun for solutions. He knew there was some path to resolving their current predicament, and that he would simply have to search it out, yet no matter where he looked, he saw nothing. He had seen the speed that most arachnoids used while thoroughly prowling, and knew it would not be long before it came around the corner and saw them. But there had to be a way because there always was, so if he could not manage to find said path, then that would only be due to his own failures as a problem solver, and if any of the others died from that, then their blood would be on his hands.

Oliver was ripped from his spinning thoughts as Talal stepped up beside him and spoke softly to him. “You are scared of spiders, aren’t you?” Talal asked.

“Beyond terrified, yes” Oliver spoke quickly as he kept searching for a path to survival.

“And you still came in here?”

Oliver paused to look at him with a brilliant smile “of course, after all, I can be as terrified as I wish so long as it only affects me, but I could never abandon others for the sake of my phobia”

Talal looked at him consideringly for a moment before he sighed “you truly are a wonderful person, possibly the best of us all.” Oliver heard him take a deep breath, even as he frantically returned to searching.

“I am nowhere near sufficient to hold such a title, though my mother possibly could”

Talal seemed to purposefully overhear his words, as he simply continued “which is why I am sure you will play along with this, to ensure that as many of us survive as possible” then, Oliver felt a strong shove against his back, stronger than any human could hope to be, and he fell to the middle of the pit.

He could not even scream as he fell, too preoccupied with processing the ramifications of Talal’s actions and words, until he finally realized what Talal wished of him. He wanted a noble sacrifice.

“Oliver! Don't!” Talal’s baritone voice called out, drawing the others out of their feud to look at Oliver with concern and confusion, even from Kelris.

Oliver took a moment to consider what Talal had done, before coming to terms with the truth that he possibly would have come to this conclusion himself either way, if a bit too late. His body finally landed on the springy web of thread, far too sticky for him to bounce, meaning he simply lay, spreading vibrations all around himself.

He could quite honestly accept the idea of dying to save others, even if not exactly by his own choice, and while he could not agree with Talal’s actions, he was happy that it at least was him, and not any others of their group. And perhaps Talal would learn from this, and become better in the future, because if he spoke up, he had the creeping suspicion that Talal may join him in the pit.

Oliver glanced around at the many Archnoids streaming from all entrances and from all over the pit and swiftly came to the understanding that he could never condemn another person to such a fate.

He forced his face into a bright grin as he looked towards the others “No need for concern! This is all part of the foolproof ABC method for surviving arachnid lairs, the secret letter, D, for self-sacrifice! Now that may not be a D to you, but remember, that is simply due to the translation errors!” Oliver called out, winking to Talal, whose face twisted in a mix of guilt and horror as he looked at the arachnoids bearing down upon Oliver from all directions.

Qrulir merely nodded to him, and while Oliver had neither a method to attain confirmation on the subject nor a grand enough friendship to intuitively understand Qrulir, he was still almost certain he understood. He had a strange feeling that he did so to confirm that self-sacrifice was, in fact, a word beginning with the fourth letter of their alphabet.

What a strange coincidence, Oliver thought, a fraction of a second before he was overwhelmed by a flood of arachnoids.